


Some Points

by ElephantOfAfrica



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Arab Character, Fanwork Research & Reference Guides, Muslim Character, Queer Character, Written by an Arab, read this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-29
Updated: 2020-08-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:34:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25598143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElephantOfAfrica/pseuds/ElephantOfAfrica
Summary: Just some information that I think is important.Answering questions like:Is the Arabic dialogue in my fic correct?Should I use the term Saracen to describe Arab Muslims in my fic?Why is Yusuf only referred to as Joe in the movie?Why was there no Arabic in the movie?How can I portray Joe's religion in my fic?Crugayders. Yes? No?Does my fanwork Have to be historically accurate??What's up with "habibi"?
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 250
Kudos: 607
Collections: The Old Guard Resources





	1. Chapter 1

Okay it seems some points need to be made:

• Regarding Arabic _dialogue_ : if you go on Google translate and you enter a line of dialogue and get your arabic translation and put it in as dialogue for your character, no matter how grammatically correct it is I'm sorry to say it's still wrong. Because google translate 1) will give you a literal translation 2) will give it to you in Standard Arabic (Fus'ha) which no one Speaks! 

• What? no one speaks Standard Arabic? Yup!! It sounds hella goofy when the dialogue is in Fus'ha. Think of Standard Arabic like Shakespearean English. No one talks like that, not even back then. Unless they're on stage reciting poetry or actual translated Shakespeare. [I wrote a whole thing](https://my-terrible-life.tumblr.com/post/624352413232611328) about it here. Every country has its own dialect of Arabic and that's what your character would be speaking.

• It would actually be so much better if you wrote your dialogue in English as you would normally and just say that the character spoke this line in Arabic/chosen Arabic dialect. (But that's just my opinion anyway) 

Please note that this is about dialogue specifically! [ _Fun Fact_ ] In many contemporary Arabic writings authors will write like as follows: Standard Arabic Standard Arabic, "Dialect Arabic for speech," Standard Arabic. 

• I know this is a shiny new sandbox that we're all exploring and we're all excited but **maybe take a moment before you liberally use a medieval offensive term for Arab Muslims.** No one's looking to fan works for historical accuracy. You don't need to use that word. It's hurtful and genuinely makes me side eye you. I've seen you all gleefully sprinkle it everywhere. It's saracen btw. Just say Arab. And no need to refer to an entire race as filthy, c'mon it's 2020.

 **[Next day edit!]** I've had some great convos in the comments but I thought I should add this here just to be sure in case you don't read comments: 

Like i mentioned in some other replies, I'm not an expert on the time period. But I do know how it made me feel seeing how the fandom was using that word. And the word itself is **not** categorized as a slur or offensive but I think with a quick google search you can pick up the context and what it means. Even if I'm completely wrong and it's a completely harmless term, I know that I didn't like how it made me feel. 

And, if you can, for more on this check out comments by user _crycrywolf_ down in the comment section! 

_**[Few days later edit]**_ Check out [this awesome post on hottopicmonk's tumblr](https://hottopicmonk.tumblr.com/post/625333394491015168/im-only-messaging-because-while-we-should-be) where a few of us had a very good discussion that pretty much summed up the whole "Should I use that term in my fics?" thing. Hottopicmonk gave some context that was unknown to me which is the fact that the term is still somewhat in use and indeed has derogatory implications. _So yeah, really really try not to use it._

• Yusuf has many spellings: Yusef, Youssef, Yousef... they all work it's okay. (Except this one: Yosef) 

• I guess I should break down his name too. He's Yusuf ibn Ibrahim ibn Mohammed ibn Al Kaysani. This "ibn" between the names means "son of" and that's how names were carried long long ago, now we've made away with the ibn's so his modern name would be just all of that minus the ibn parts. There are still countries that hold this tradition, they're mostly countries in the Arabian Peninsula and it's usually "ben" instead of "ibn" over there. This does not mean that Joe's middle name is Ibrahim, Arabs born in Arab countries don't have middle names. Yusuf is his name, Ibrahim is his Dad's name, Mohammed is his Grandfather, and Al Kaysani is the family name. 

• I'm an Arab who lives in an Arab country and literally every single Yusef I've met was nicknamed Jo/Joe. It's the automatic nickname for that name so chill guys. 

• I was genuinely ecstatic about the nickname because I thought it was a nod to the fact that this is the common nickname used in Arab countries now. I was like duh of course he's Joe, and it's amazing that they knew enough about us to call him that.

• I'm actually glad there was no Arabic in the movie. Arabic is really hard guys and it's been goofed in American media 9 times out of 10. Doesn't matter that they have an Arab in the cast, if his Arabic has not been practiced since childhood it's going to be obvious. (For example: Rami Malek and Mina Masoud, it's clear to my ears that they need practice) I don't know how Marwan's Arabic sounds like tbh but even if it's very good I still don't know how effective it can be to teach his co-stars to say anything in Arabic phonetically, ya know for those of you lamenting on why we didn't hear any Arabic in the movie or calling for Arabic dialogue in the possible sequel. There's many sounds in all Arabic dialects that take years to be trained into your throat and mouth so *shrug emoji*.

• Like with the language I would rather have the religion not be "represented" at all than be represented wrong/weird ie: from a purely western scope. So if some of you want to HC him as non-religious, or non-practicing, or whatever that's fine in my own opinion. Better that than messing it up. 

• If you must address religion in your fan work, do some reading. Understand there are 2 factions within Islam. Understand that attitude about religion of Muslims who live within the Arab World is different than that of the Muslims who live outside of it. Religion is personal and can be different from one person to the next. There are general rules and practices of course like any religion. Just do some reading and then try to ask an Arab Muslim.

• Understand that during the time period you're targeting there were Muslim Arabs, Christian Arabs, and Jewish Arabs. And all of them fought to protect their land. So a Muslim Arab back then would never curse out Christians in general as I've seen some of ya'll have written. That's gross. And also very unacceptable in Islam. It's very not okay to curse any of the 3 Abrahamic religions and those who subscribe to them. You want to refer to the European armies from the POV of an Arab? Use "invader". Or Foreigner since we have a very similar word in Arabic. 

• Muslims eat Halal (but some can choose not to) and if that's unavailable we look for Kosher stuff, we can eat that no problem. Also we have a blanket permission to eat/drink anything in dire situations. Number 1 objective is preserving life!

• Joe is seen with a drink at the end of the movie. Some Muslims choose to drink. Like I said, relationship with religion differs from one person to another. 

• Before seeing those character bios on ig, I didn't know that Yusuf was from Maghreb. I assumed from the fact that he was in the war that he would be from Egypt or Syria or Palestine. It would make sense for him to be, but whatever, these gaps in canon allow the fans to give him many interesting back stories. **Again none of them have to be historically accurate! Just be kind when writing about a culture that's not yours!!**

• Just, as an Arab, you'll never find me referring to them as Crugayders. Make of that what you will.

• Joe wasn't???? a crusader???? Makes no sense to call him that????!?!! He was literally fighting against them?? 

• Nicky is not a crusader anymore. He was on the wrong side of history. Yes! He was doing something bad. Characters grow and recognize their mistakes. Also makes no sense to call him a crusader if you've set him up in present times???!! (Like, crusader wrath, crusader strength, what???? Do you guys know what you're saying??) 

• Sorry I got a little frustrated there. Moving on,

• The crusades were the primer for all the colonialism that happened afterwards. They were not good. Or justified. Or the least bit okay. Google the colonization of Africa please.

• Again no one is looking for historical accuracy in your fan work, don't stress yourself out with translations and research if you don't have to. But if you must! **Just be kind**. And talk to an Arab Muslim if you're genuinely curious. Of course read first, we're not Wikipedia! 

• Finally, I'm not here to police anyone's writing or whatever, just making some points that seem to genuinely not be known. If you wanna add your dialogue in Standard Arabic go ahead if that makes you happy. If you wanna ignore everything I've pointed out 🤷♀️ I'm not your boss. _But do tag your content accordingly._

  
• I hope this cleared up some things. 

Do check out the comments, we go deeper into some discussions re: religion, culture, fandom, etc. and even explain the _Habibi_ thing lol. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Check out the comments for more information!
> 
> More on culture and language, find comment thread with: setos_puppy, and crycrywolf. 
> 
> More on language specifically, comment thread with: Wind_Ryder and uri6. 
> 
> On being kind in fandom, comment thread with: DarthLumiya 
> 
> On religion, comment threads with: Ghrelt, Liggytheauthoress, and Waid. And Onlymystory.
> 
> On "habibi", comment threads with: FiercePassions, Elissa and Onlymystory, and 1derspark. 
> 
> On Queerness and faith, comment thread with: Teddalino. 
> 
> Thanks to everyone who commented and shared their thoughts with me ❤


	2. note

If you feel like it, do check out the updates to the post, there's links. 

And big thanks to everyone who shared their thoughts and ideas and questions with me ❤ 

And huge claps to all content creators in this fandom 👏 👏 over a thousand works in 2 weeks! 

**Author's Note:**

> Check out the comments for more information!
> 
> More on culture and language, find comment thread with: setos_puppy, and crycrywolf. 
> 
> More on language specifically, comment thread with: Wind_Ryder and uri6. 
> 
> On being kind in fandom, comment thread with: DarthLumiya 
> 
> On religion, comment threads with: Ghrelt, Liggytheauthoress, and Waid. And Onlymystory. 
> 
> On "habibi", comment threads with: FiercePassions, Elissa and Onlymystory, and 1derspark. 
> 
> On Queerness and faith, comment thread with: Teddalino. 
> 
> A very lovely and informative comment by a Moroccan fan, comment thread with: Idontlikenicknames  
> https://archiveofourown.org/comments/369396073
> 
> Thanks to everyone who commented and shared their thoughts with me ❤

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Habibi Through the Years](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26191471) by [MeanderingStream](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MeanderingStream/pseuds/MeanderingStream)
  * [Italian thing](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27025534) by [GioTanner](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GioTanner/pseuds/GioTanner)




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